the bricks intermingled with lines of black, in which now live the chaplain and others on the north, and on the south Her Royal Highness Princess Frederica of Hanover.[1]
The little gardens, the creepers here and there, set off the old buildings well. But the dignity of the building, as Wolsey designed it, is gone. The great gate itself has no longer its five storeys and its pinnacles with their lead cupolas, but has dwindled, under a restoration of George III.'s, to three storeys and towers that rise but slightly over the adjacent building. But from the first the tall chimneys strike the eye. They, too, it is plain, in most cases are restorations, but restorations according to the exact pattern of the originals. Each of them has its pattern, and the different coloured bricks, where they are preserved, add a peculiar distinction to the lofty clusters, which become an ornament where a less skilful arrangement would have disfigured the court.
Through the great gate, with its groined ceiling, we pass into the first or Base Court. This at once strikes the visitor as being very low on the north and south in proportion to the high Gate-house and Clock-tower. This effect would not have been so noticeable had the cupolas with which the smaller turrets were decorated
- ↑ Part of this was at one time the residence of the "Lady house-keeper," an official of great pomp, while the rooms at the south-west are said to have been those long dwelt in by Mistress Pen, foster-mother to King Edward VI., whose ghost, they say, still haunts the precincts.
